


Four Years Without You

by DBSJ_lines



Category: DBSK | Tohoshinki | TVfXQ | TVXQ, Super Junior
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-10
Updated: 2015-06-10
Packaged: 2018-04-03 18:06:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4110124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DBSJ_lines/pseuds/DBSJ_lines
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yunho is enlisting in the army. Changmin is enlisting soon after and comes to a terrible conclusion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Four Years Without You

Kyuhyun checked his phone for the third time in the last fifteen minutes and stared daggers at the, once again, message-less home screen. He was giving it ten, no five minutes before he reached out first, despite the breach in normal end-of-the-day texting protocol. It had been nearly a month since Kyuhyun had last seen Changmin, and he was looking forward to seeing him. Kyuhyun was frankly alarmed that Changmin hadn’t texted him yet since they had made plans to hang out at least a week ago, and Changmin never missed a scheduled hang-out session.

After five more minutes elapsed, Kyuhyun, who had been more or less watching the minutes tick by, typed a new message to Changmin: “ _You… home?_ ” 

Normally, Changmin would simply text a hurried “ _home_ ” and expect Kyuhyun to show up after the approximately ten minutes it took to get from the Super Junior dorm to Changmin’s apartment on the rare days when they already knew both of them were free. This ritual was so ingrained that Kyuhyun was genuinely concerned by the break of tradition and assumed something must be wrong. Had Changmin and Yunho been fighting again? Probably not, since Changmin usually liked venting to Kyuhyun in those situations. Was Changmin having one of his semi-annual meltdowns about his lack of a normal life? Again, unlikely because those usually called for a case of beer, Chinese takeout, and an all-night gaming session with Kyuhyun.

After a few minutes of waiting, Changmin finally responded: “ _Oh… yeah I guess so_ ”. Kyuhyun glared at the response. What the hell was that? He guesses he’s home? What does that mean? Kyuhyun grabbed his things somewhat more slowly than normal and headed dejectedly towards the door. If Changmin was mad at him, which certainly seemed to be the case, Kyuhyun needed to go over there and figure out what was wrong. They never fought. In the nine years Kyuhyun had known Changmin, they had never genuinely been angry at each other. Annoyed? Sure. Situationally distant? Sometimes, if they were both overwhelmingly busy. On his way out, he grabbed two bottles of Merlot instead of the customary one. Kyuhyun had a feeling they might need it. As he passed Heechul in the hallway, he fought back the urge to grab him and force him over to Changmin’s as well, but that was ridiculous. What, was Kyuhyun scared of his best friend? No, absolutely not. Kyuhyun had to go at this alone. Besides, it was just a cryptic text.

Changmin and Kyuhyun had been best friends for approximately nine years. After Kyuhyun had joined Super Junior, the two had been automatically drawn towards each other. Kyuhyun remembered the DBSK hyungs forcing Changmin to “go over and talk to him, for god’s sake” after a couple weeks of awkward encounters. Changmin had been so nervous meeting anyone back then, but according to the others, he hadn’t stopped talking about Kyuhyun since Kyuhyun had been unceremoniously thrown in Super Junior. After years of being the maknae of the entire company, Changmin finally had a same-age friend but had still been too nervous to initiate conversation. Typical Changmin, really. However, as soon as the two formally met, sparks flew. It was immediately apparent how much they had in common, and Kyuhyun was equally happy having found someone he liked who genuinely liked him back in the company. Those first few years had been difficult for Kyuhyun, and Changmin had been one of the reasons he’d been able to endure it.

As they got older, busier, more famous, and as various difficulties crossed their paths, Changmin and Kyuhyun became each other’s biggest source of support. Nobody understood them as well as they understood each other. Both were willing to drop anything and everything to run to the other if he truly needed it, which, given their line of business, required quite a bit of travel and sacrifice. It sounded dramatic, but it really wasn’t, not to them. They naturally turned to each other to work on their problems. Hiding things from each other never even crossed their minds, which suggested to Kyuhyun that whatever was upsetting Changmin now had something to do with him.

Which was why Kyuhyun felt a slight trill of fear course through his body as he unlocked Changmin’s apartment door and stepped inside.

“Chwang,” Kyuhyun called out apprehensively as he looked around. The apartment was mostly dark and quiet. When Kyuhyun turned the corner, he saw Changmin sitting on the couch, staring unseeingly at the blank screen of the television.

“Uh, Changmin?” called Kyuhyun nervously, “Everything alright there?” He was starting to get seriously concerned.

“Oh, Kyuhyun,” said Changmin with what sounded like forced enthusiasm, “you came!”

Kyuhyun sat next to Changmin and pulled out one of the bottles of wine. “Wanna play drunk driving?” asked Kyuhyun, mirroring the forced enthusiasm. Drunk driving was one of Changmin’s favorite drinking games, which required drinking an entire alcoholic beverage while completing a race in Mario Kart. “Drunk driving,” however, wasn’t allowed, meaning dropping the controller while actually drinking. It required a surprising amount of strategy for such a stupid game. Kyuhyun had decided to proceed as if nothing was wrong until Changmin either cheered up or brought up the issue on his own.

“Sure, yeah!” replied Changmin as he busied himself setting up the game. Maybe everything was fine after all.

After losing the first two rounds to Changmin, Kyuhyun was starting to feel the effects of the wine and slight annoyance at Changmin’s ceaseless smack talking. On top of which, Changmin had won the previous match at the last second after throwing a blue spiny shell and then laughing in his face about it.

“You suck, Kyu,” taunted Changmin, “I’m not sure why you wanted to play this game in the first place. You know you always lose.”

“Just trying to keep you happy,” hissed Kyuhyun through gritted teeth while resisting the urge to chuck his controller out the window.

“Didn’t quite catch that. I understand. Being in the presence of such unbridled talent can leave a person pretty tongue-tied. If you want to quit, I won’t hold it against you. We can’t all be Mario Kart geniuses. You tried. You should be proud you were even in the race to begin with!”

“Changmin,” spat Kyuhyun as he set up the next race, “I swear, I’m going to kill you one day. And this round is mine, so you better shut your mouth.”

This time, Kyuhyun hit Changmin with three consecutive red shells just before the finish line and zoomed past him to claim first.

“Yes!” screamed Kyuhyun while jumping to his feet. “Take that! Oh my god, I feel so much better. How the mighty have fallen.” He looked at Changmin, expecting a temper tantrum of some sort, but instead saw that Changmin had merely dropped his controller and was staring into his wine glass.

“We’ll still be friends, right? On the other side,” said Changmin in nearly a whisper.

“What?” Kyuhyun hadn’t expected that.

“I’m leaving. Soon. Hell, Yunho is leaving on July 21st, but don’t get me started on that, seriously,” said Changmin quickly, the game quickly forgotten. “Have I ever expressed an interest in being a solo artist? Geez, how did it come to this? Anyway, I mapped it out, Kyu,” said Changmin wildly while gesturing to a sheet of paper on his desk that appeared to contain several graphs. “I’m leaving by the end of the year for two years. Two years, Kyu. By midway through next year, Super Junior will have like five active members, so there’s no way you’ll be able to enlist until at least 2017, which incidentally is when I come back. But you’ll be gone already by then, which means—which means—“ Changmin trailed off while looking at the floor. He appeared to be blinking back tears.

Kyuhyun was gripping the stem of his wine glass so hard it threatened to break. Changmin was upset. Changmin might actually start crying. In front of Kyuhyun. It wouldn’t be the first time, but Kyuhyun was not well equipped to deal with tears, regardless of whose tears they were. He could feel the panic building as he waited for Changmin to continue. When he didn’t Kyuhyun opened his mouth nervously.

“Changmin,” he said blankly, “it’s—it’s going to be okay. Of course we’ll still be friends. How can you even ask that?”

“Four years!” exclaimed Changmin, now staring intently at Kyuhyun. Despite many years of friendship, the intensity of Changmin’s gaze still unnerved him. “We’ll hardly see each other for four whole years. I don’t—I don’t know what I’m going to do. Sorry, I know this is a little intense, but you’ve always been there, and I’m going to be alone! In the _army_. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t scared, and I won’t even have any friends around. I’ll be alone with a bunch of strangers. And I know they’ll all stare at me like I’m some kind of freak. I know Yunho will be fine, but he makes friends so easily! What the hell am I going to do? Famous and quiet and awkward and probably older than everyone else. I, seriously—“

“Changmin!” Kyuhyun interjected hurriedly, “Slow down! Listen, I’m scared of going to the army too, but half of Super Junior survived. You’ll be fine too. It’s going to be fine. And we’ll get to talk a bit. You can tell me all about it.” Changmin was really going to start crying now. Kyuhyun knew how much he hated crying in front of people, so he had to be really upset. He tentatively stuck out his arm and put it around Changmin’s shoulder. Changmin might be awkward, but Kyuhyun swore he was more awkward, especially when it came to comforting crying people.

Changmin leaned into Kyuhyun’s embrace and let his tears spill. After a few minutes, Kyuhyun began running his fingers through Changmin’s hair. “Chwang, I get it. I’m sorry. I wish it could happen another way. I’ve thought about it too. It really sucks, doesn’t it? Everyone else gets to go to the army with their same-age friends, but not us. We don’t get to do anything like everyone else, do we? And this time we won’t even have each other. But, you’ll make friends, Changmin. You always do, even if it takes you a little bit longer than other people. I should know, I’m the same way. Just don’t glare at them, alright? Then you’ll be famous, quiet, awkward, old, and scarier than the drill instructors.”

Changmin finally laughed. “I guess you’re right,” he said after a minute, “I just so wish we could go together, I guess, and when they announced Yunho’s enlistment date yesterday, it all just hit me. Sorry.”

“Totally understandable, dude. We’re gonna have an awesome time up until you leave, though. What do you want to do? Let’s run away and go pub hopping in London or something. Think we can swing it?”

“Maybe if we run really fast,” said Changmin playfully. Kyuhyun hit him and poured them another glass of wine.

\--

An hour later, the latest episode of Game of Thrones played on the television in front of two entangled sleeping figures on the couch. Changmin had fallen asleep on Kyuhyun’s shoulder at some point, and Kyuhyun had pulled him down with him as he fell asleep soon after.

Several hours passed until finally Kyuhyun’s alarm blared into the stillness of the morning. Kyuhyun shut it off quickly, careful not to wake Changmin up, and slowly disentangled himself from his sleeping best friend. As he looked back at Changmin just before leaving, he felt tears spring to his eyes. Nights like these were dwindling in number. Changmin was right. They were going to be separated for four years.

There was nothing to do but swallow his tears and head out into the new day. They’d survive. They always had.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been thinking about this a lot recently. I'm pretty sure Changmin and Kyuhyun's enlistments will end up this way and am a little distraught about it.


End file.
